Since mid-December, China has gathered all kinds of winter disastrous weather such as cold waves, rain and snow, low temperatures, and freezing. According to the meteorological department, the cold wave that has just passed is the strongest cold wave in December since the complete meteorological record.
Looking back on 2023, extreme weather such as cold waves, high temperatures, heavy rains, and sandstorms are frequent, and data such as temperature and precipitation have repeatedly broken records. Extreme weather was originally a technical term to describe rare weather, but nowadays, frequent extreme weather seems to have become the new normal. Will there be so much extreme weather in 2024?
In many places, there was "the coldest mid-December".
"Cold" is what most people have been feeling lately. According to the statistics of the meteorological department, Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei, Henan, Liaoning, Inner Mongolia and Heilongjiang have just experienced the coldest mid-December.
Taking Beijing as an example, the cold wave and low temperature weather have broken a number of records one after another. Yin Jiongyin, a senior meteorological engineer, introduced that from the low temperature extreme, -15 on the 17th5 It was the third lowest in mid-December since meteorological records began, after December 19 and 20, 1951. In terms of average temperature, the average temperature in mid-December is -70 is the lowest in history. From December 16 to 23, the lowest temperature at the observatory in the southern suburbs, which represents the "temperature of Beijing", was lower than -12 for 8 consecutive days, ranking the second longest in history.
From the perspective of the weather duration below 0, from 23:32 on December 10 to 10:44 on the 25th, the temperature at the observatory was lower than 0, and the cumulative duration was close to 350 hours, which was the first in history. Yoon told reporters.
According to the statistics of the China Meteorological Administration, from December 13 to 16, under the influence of the strongest cold wave this winter, China's land of about 3.27 million square kilometers experienced a strong cooling of more than 10. After the cold wave cools down, the replenishment of cold air is still continuous, so that the temperature is kept at a low level.
Since mid-December, a total of 78 national meteorological observation stations across the country have seen their minimum temperatures fall below the historical extremes of DecemberThe minimum temperature of 12 observation stations in Shanxi, Hebei, Inner Mongolia, Hunan and other places exceeded the historical extreme value since the establishment of the local stationThe regional average temperature in North China, Huanghuai, Northeast China and Inner Mongolia was the lowest since 1961.
Cooling and warm and humid air currents collide with rain and snow. From December 10th to 19th, snowfall spread from North China, Huanghuai and other places to Jianghuai and northern Jiangnan. On December 25, Guangzhou even experienced its first snowfall since the founding of the People's Republic of China.
The persistent low temperature makes it difficult for the snow to melt, and the North China and Huanghuai regions are covered with snow for a long time. The snow depth in southern Beijing, southern Tianjin, central and southern Hebei, most of Shanxi, northern Henan, northern Shandong and the peninsula is 10 20 cm, and the Shandong Peninsula is more than 50 cm locally. In addition, the combination of low temperature and precipitation caused freezing rain in Guizhou, Hunan, northern Jiangxi, southern Anhui, eastern Hubei, central and western Henan, western Shandong, and central Fujian.
Rain, snow and low temperatures test road traffic, as well as water supply, electricity and heating. On the evening of December 13, a low-temperature rain, snow and freezing disaster occurred in Yuncheng City, Shanxi Province, and four transmission lines in Yuanqu County, Yuncheng City failed, resulting in a large-scale power outage in the local area.
The Shandong Peninsula suffered a "cold blizzard", and the snow depth reached 74 cm at 8 o'clock on the 22nd in Weihai, breaking through the historical extreme value of Shandong snow depth (54 cm, December 13, 2005), and the maximum snow depth in Yantai was also above 50 cm. The snow has crushed farmers' greenhouses, which has also seriously affected transportation. In Yantai, trucks lined up to dump snow into the sea.
Due to the continuous low temperature, the heating system has continuously increased the heating guarantee, and the pipeline has been continuously operated at high temperature and high pressure, and the thermal pipeline leakage has occurred in many places.
Global warming and extreme cold spells do not coincide
This violent cold spell is rare. According to Zhou Bing, a second-level researcher at the National Climate Center, from December 14 to 17, the comprehensive intensity of the cold wave weather process experienced in the central and eastern parts of China was slightly stronger than that of the cold wave process from December 4 to 7, 2008, which was the strongest cold wave in December since 1961.
At present, the strongest cold spell in December and the cold air that lasted for 10 days have come to an end. After December 25, the temperature will warm up across the board. Recently, the temperature in Beijing has also been slowly rising, "From the perspective of probability, it is difficult for Beijing to have such a long-term and high-intensity low temperature this winter." However, as the frequency of extreme weather continues to increase due to climate warming, a 'fast transition between cold and warm' is still very likely. When it comes to whether there will be extreme cold in Beijing this winter, Yin still considers climate warming as an influencing variable.
From a national perspective, in the second half of this winter, there may be a phased strong cooling and heavy snowfall process in the northern region again, and there may be phased low temperature rain, snow and freezing weather in the south of the Yangtze River and the eastern part of the southwest region.
In the context of global warming, why is there a strong cold wave recently?Zhou Bing explained that the cold wave and recent cold air activity are a "small episode" of global warming or a warm winter.
According to the National Climate Center, when it comes to a certain year or a certain month, it is not determined by a single weather event, but by comparing the average temperature of the entire period of time, whether it is significantly higher or lower than the same period in history. For example, from November 3 to 7 this autumn, there was a cold wave weather process in most parts of China, during which the temperature fell off a cliff, but if you calculate the average temperature of the whole autumn, it is found to be the highest since 1961, so it is the "warmest autumn".
In the context of global warming, the warming of the Arctic and the weakening of the westerly jet stream have led to a series of mutual influences, which make it easier for cold air to move south, and cold events such as cold waves are frequent. In other words, the overall temperature is on the warm side, but the fluctuations in cold and warm are more pronounced, and both cold and heat are extreme. Therefore, global warming and the emergence of extreme cold waves do not coincide.
China is a climate change sensitive area and a significant impact area, although the warming rate is higher than the global average, the intensity of extreme cold waves has not weakened, and the impact range of strong cold air or cold waves will increase.
Will extreme weather become normalized?
According to Zhou Bing, the strongest cold wave weather process in the past December was an extreme event. Extreme events, also known as extreme weather and climate events, generally occur less than 5% or 10% of the time. However, in recent years, the word "extreme" has appeared frequently, and it is very common for data such as temperature and precipitation to break records.
This week is the last week of 2023, and looking back on this year, extreme weather has been frequent: strong sandstorms, Typhoon "Dusuri" and historic heavy rains in North China, Typhoon "Haikui" and heavy rains in South China, strong tornadoes in Jiangsu, extreme high temperatures in summer, "bad rains" in wheat summer harvest areas, ......Zhang Tao, chief forecaster of the Meteorological Observatory, said that there are actually many extreme weather and climate events every year, which are determined by China's vast area, complex geography, diverse climate, and monsoon climate characteristics. "It happens every year, but the type and intensity will vary. ”
If you ask about the most extreme weather in China in 2023, Zhou Bing believes that the weather in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region is the most indicative. In spring, the sandstorms in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei began to increase after many years of silence;From early summer to July, four consecutive rounds of high temperature and heat waves, and a heavy rainstorm once in 140 years, caused floods in the Haihe River BasinIn autumn, there were extremely warm temperatures in the early stage, and three rounds of cold waves began in November.
Will extreme weather become the new normal in the future?Zhou Bing believes that there is no need to wait for the future, and now the frequent occurrence of extreme weather around the world has become the new normal. With the intensification of global warming, the frequency of extreme weather and climate events has changed, showing a trend of frequent, widespread, strong and concurrent. Extreme weather is no longer uncommon.
Zhang Tao believes that in 2024, high temperatures, heavy rains, droughts, typhoons, strong convection, cold waves, sandstorms, fog and other weather will not be missing. As for whether the total number will increase and whether the extremity will become stronger and stronger, the current academic consensus is that in the context of global warming, it is very likely to show the above trend in the long run, but it will not be like this every year, and the overall trend is spiraling and reciprocating. It is uncertain to ask if there will be more extreme weather in 2024 than in 2023.
In addition, further warming will exacerbate the region's exposure to greater climate risks. In the future, the average temperature in China will continue to rise, and the increase will gradually increase from southeast to northwest, and the warming range in the north will be greater than that in the south, and the warming will be more obvious in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, northern Xinjiang and some parts of northeast China. Extremely heavy precipitation and major drought events are still on the rise.
When extreme weather becomes the new normal, how should we respond to and defend against it scientifically?Zhou Bing said that in the face of new characteristics such as the frequent and strong occurrence of extreme weather and climate events in the context of global warming, there is still a gap and shortcomings between China's risk management ability to deal with extreme events and the needs of national economic and social development in the new era.
He suggested that in terms of system construction, it is necessary to incorporate the prevention of climate change risks into the national system, strengthen the capacity to adapt to climate change, and establish an early warning system for climate security. It is necessary to strengthen scientific research on climate change risk prevention, improve the ability of meteorological disaster risk management, strengthen the dissemination of disaster prevention and mitigation science, and improve the public's awareness of disaster risk prevention.
*: Beijing News.
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